Review: Dirty Rowdy Thing by Christina Lauren

Synopsis from Goodreads:

From the New York Times bestselling author of Beautiful Bastard,Beautiful Stranger, and Beautiful Player, Book Two of the brand-new Wild Seasons series that started with Sweet Filthy Boy—a story of friends, love, and lust.

Despite their rowdy hookups, Harlow and Finn don’t even like each other…which would explain why their marriage lasted only twelve hours. He needs to be in charge and takes whatever he wants. She lives by the Want-something-done? Do-it-yourself mantra. Maybe she’s too similar to the rugged fisherman—or just what he needs.

Wendy’s Review: 4 Skulls – B

I have to say, I almost didn’t review this book so before I get into the actual review let me start by saying that I heard that this may possibly be a series that might have started as a twific. Apparently their Beautiful Bastard series was originally a twific and it was thought that this series may be also. For me, and I can’t stress this enough, for ME that puts a huge dark shadow over my enjoyment of a series. Where before I only saw an original story I now see similarities all over the place. And sadly, since I am not a fan of Twilight (though I did read them all), those types of similarities are not good. I did some googling and while I could find information about Beautiful Bastard and Twilight, I couldn’t actually find anything about this specific series so it’s possible that this series was a completely new book. I still felt that it bears mentioning, in case others try to avoid books derived from fanfic. Do with it what you will.

I did end up deciding to review this Dirty Rowdy Thing, and I think I’ll even keep reading them. You can see that I rated this book a B, which is the same rating that I gave the first book. What I think I really like about these books is that they give the characters a kink without making it overwhelming or uncomfortable. I like erotica, but sometimes I read an erotica book and even if I enjoyed it I may get squirmy if it seems to cross a line or get out of control. I don’t think the authors of these books do that. I think that they manage to be sexy and hot without making the reader (me) squirm. I also like the differing personality and characteristics of the heroes. They’re not similar at all, and yet in their differences they’re equally crushable. I found Ansel and Finn equally attractive, and I’m really excited to read about Ollie because he’s nerdy hot and Australian. Yum! Honestly, the same is true of the girls. They seem to be written unique to each other, and I don’t spend the whole time reading rolling my eyes at them and feeling like they’re caricatures of women.

On the flipside, I have to warn you that my 4 star rating is what I like to call a ‘shallow rating’. What that means is that while actively reading I am enjoying myself, so they get a B. That is a ‘Surface B’ because ultimately is that what happens after I have finished them and a few weeks/months go by I’ll have forgotten all about them. They were good on the surface, it feeds the shallowness inside me, but there was nothing in them that took me deeper.

I read them, I enjoyed them, and now I’ll move on from them without looking back. Sometimes a shallowly good book is exactly what the doctor ordered.